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InterSystems Database requirements: IBM Spectrum Copy Data Management 2.2.19

Detailed System Requirements


Abstract

This document details the backup and restore requirements for InterSystems Database for IBM Spectrum Copy Data Management 2.2.19

Content

This document is divided into linked sections for ease of navigation. Use the following links to jump to the section of the document that you require:



 

General

  • On IBM Spectrum Copy Data Management environment, InterSystems Caché and InterSystems IRIS collectively referred to as InterSystems Database.
  • IBM Spectrum Copy Data Management installs an agent on application servers when they are registered. Some anti-virus software might flag or attempt to remove the agent software. If you run anti-malware software application servers, exclude the installation path of the IBM Spectrum Copy Data Management agent.
  • For Linux-based and AIX-based systems, the agent installation directory must be excluded for any anti-virus software scans. Add this path to the exclusion list for all anti-virus software that is installed on the application server. For Oracle (Linux and AIX/Power), Caché and IRIS (on Linux and AIX/Power), and SAP HANA (on Linux and Power): 
    /tmp/cdm_guestapps_username
    Where cdm_guestapps_username is the username of the account used to register the application server in IBM Spectrum Copy Data Management.
  • IBM Spectrum Copy Data Management support for third-party operating systems, applications, services, and hardware depend on the respective vendor. If a third-party product or version moves into extended support, self-service support, or end-of-life, IBM Spectrum Copy Data Management supports the product or version at the same level as the vendor. See also IBM Support General Guidelines and Limitations - IBM support for software on unsupported operating systems



 

Configuration

Supported platforms and configurations

Table 1: InterSystems Database configuration requirements
Operating system
  • Caché 2015 or later [1]
  • Caché 2016 or later [1]
  • Caché 2017 or later [1]
  • Caché 2018 or later [1]
  • IRIS 2021 or later [1]
  • IRIS 2022 or later [1] (beginning with 2.2.19)
Storage system
  • IBM Spectrum Virtualize Software 7.3 or later, 8.1.2 or later, 8.4 or later and 8.5 or later
    - IBM SAN Volume Controller [6]
    - IBM Storwize [6]
    - IBM FlashSystem [6]
  • Pure Storage running Pure APIs 1.5 or later [7]
    - FlashArray//c
    - FlashArray//m
    - FlashArray//x
    - FlashArray 4xx series
Server types Operating Systems Storage Configuration
Physical
  • AIX 6.1 TL9 or later [5]
  • AIX 7.1 or later [5] [8]
  • AIX 7.2 or later [5] [8] (beginning with 2.2.19)
  • AIX 7.3 or later [5] [8] (beginning with 2.2.19)
  • CentOS 7.0 or later
  • Fibre Channel
  • iSCSI
Virtual (VMware) [2, 4]
  • Red Hat Enterprise Linux 6.5 or later
  • CentOS 7.0 or later
  • Physical RDM backed by Fibre Channel or iSCSI disks attached to ESX [3]
  • VMDK (dependent and independent disks) on VMFS datastores backed by Fibre Channel or iSCSI disks attached to ESX
  • iSCSI disks directly attached to guest operating system [3]

Notes:

  • [1] IBM Spectrum Copy Data Management was tested against Caché 2015.3, Caché 2017, Caché 2018, IRIS 2021, and IRIS 2022.
  • [2] For supported VMware vSphere versions, see in System requirements: IBM Spectrum Copy Data Management 2.2.19.
  • [3] Select the Physical provider type when you register the provider in IBM Spectrum Copy Data Management. NetApp ONTAP storage systems are not supported. All data files and log files for an instance need to stay on either a pRDM or virtual disk.
  • [4] InterSystems Database servers registered as virtual must have the most recent version of VMware Tools installed and running.
  • [5] Supported platforms: IBM Power Systems (Little Endian).
  • [6] On IBM Systems Storage, condense is run during maintenance jobs.
  • [7] Pure storage is only supported for InterSystems Caché.
  • [8] InterSystems IRIS is tested on AIX 7.1, AIX 7.2, and AIX 7.3.

Note: If you are using IBM storage systems running IBM Spectrum Accelerate level 11.5.3 or later, including FlashSystem A9000/A9000R and IBM XIV storage systems use IBM Spectrum Copy Data Management 2.2.13.


 

InterSystems Database support for VMware virtual machines

For virtual machines, the Disk UUID option must be enabled. To enable, power off the guest machine through the vSphere client, then select the guest and click Edit Settings. Select VM Options, then Edit Configuration under the Advanced section. Add a row that states the following:

Name: disk.enableUUID
Value: TRUE

pRDM and virtual disks are supported for VMware configurations. Data files and log files for an instance need to stay on either pRDMs or virtual disks. One instance cannot use both disk types.



 

Software

  • The bash and sudo packages must be installed. Sudo must be version 1.7.6p2 or later. Run sudo -V to check the version.
  • Python version 3.x must be installed.
  • RHEL/CentOS 6.x only: Ensure the util-linux-ng package is up to date by running: 
    yum update util-linux-ng
    Depending on your version or distribution, the package might be named util-linux.
  • RHEL/CentOS 7.3 or later: A required Perl module, Digest::MD5, is not installed by default. Install the module by running: 
    yum install perl-Digest-MD5
  • Linux only: If data stays on LVM volumes, ensure the LVM version is 2.0.2.118 or later. To check the LVM version and if necessary to update the package, run: 
    lvm version
yum update lvm2
  • Linux only: If data stays on LVM volumes, the lvm2-lvmetad service must be disabled as it can interfere with IBM Spectrum Copy Data Management's ability to mount and resignature volume group snapshots or clones. Run the following commands to stop and disable the service: 
    systemctl stop lvm2-lvmetad
systemctl disable lvm2-lvmetad
  • Additionally, disable lvmetad in the LVM config file. Edit the file /etc/lvm/lvm.conf and set: 
    use_lvmetad = 0



 

Connectivity

  • The SSH service must be running on port 22 on the server and any firewalls must be configured to allow IBM Spectrum Copy Data Management to connect to the server by using SSH. The SFTP subsystem for SSH must also be enabled.
  • The server can be registered by using a DNS name or IP address. DNS names must be resolvable by IBM Spectrum Copy Data Management.
  • To mount clones or copies of data, IBM Spectrum Copy Data Management automatically maps and unmaps LUNs to the servers. Each server must be preconfigured to connect to the relevant storage systems at that site.
    • For Fibre Channel, the appropriate zoning must be configured beforehand.
    • For iSCSI, the servers must be configured beforehand to discover and log in to the targets on the storage servers.



 

Authentication and Privileges

Authentication

  • The application server must be registered in IBM Spectrum Copy Data Management by using an operating system user that exists on the server (referred to as "IBM Spectrum Copy Data Management agent user" for the rest of this topic).
  • During registration, you must provide either a password or a private SSH key that IBM Spectrum Copy Data Management uses to log in to the server.
  • For password-based authentication, ensure the password is correctly configured and that the user can log in without facing any other prompts, such as prompts to reset the password.
  • For key-based authentication, ensure the public SSH key is placed in the appropriate authorized_keys file for the IBM Spectrum Copy Data Management agent user.
    • Typically, the file is at: /home/<username>/.ssh/authorized_keys
    • Typically, the .ssh directory and all files under it need their permissions set to 600.
       

OS-level authentication must be enabled on the InterSystems Database server.

  • For the InterSystems Caché interface:
    1. Go to: System Administration > Security > System Security > Authentication/CSP Session Options.
    2. Then, select: Allow Operating System authentication.
       
    If the option Operating System is not already enabled:
    1. Go to System Administration > Security > Services > %Service_Terminal.
    2. And enable option: Operating System.
       
  • For InterSystems IRIS interface:
    1. Go to: System Administration > Security > System Security > Authentication/Web Session Options.
    2. Then, select: Allow Operating System authentication.

The user identity associated with IBM Spectrum Copy Data Management registration needs sufficient privileges to start some system commands. For example, system commands used to find disk information, and to run InterSystems Caché’s "csession" command without asking for a database username and password or InterSystem IRIS’ “iris session” command without asking for a database username and password. To enable this feature, use the InterSystems Database instance owner user after you add the user to sudoers file.


 

Privileges

The IBM Spectrum Copy Data Management agent user needs the following privileges:

  • Privileges to run commands as root and other users by using sudo. IBM Spectrum Copy Data Management requires these privileges for various tasks such as discovering storage layouts and mounting and unmounting disks.
    • The sudoers configuration must allow the IBM Spectrum Copy Data Management agent user to run commands without a password.
    • The !requiretty setting must be set.

For examples on creating a new user with the necessary privileges, see Sample Configuration of an IBM Spectrum Copy Data Management Agent User in InterSystems Database requirements.



 

Backup and restore

Backup Jobs

InterSystems Database backup jobs occur at the instance level. Multiple instances can be added to a single backup job definition, and all instances on a host are automatically discovered.
It is possible to scan in an InterSystems Database backup failover member instance or an async member instance and run snapshots against the mirror copy instead of the primary failover member.
Virtual instances can be selected for backup (such as "cachecentos6/cache_2015.3"), but it is better to select database instances explicitly. If virtual instances are selected, the associated job definition must be adjusted when the database instances are upgraded to later versions.


 

Restore Jobs

When you restore a database or file system from an XFS file system, the restore process might fail if the "xfsprogs" package version on the destination server is between 3.2.0 and 4.1.9. To resolve the issue, upgrade xfsprogs to version 4.2.0 or later.

Caché or IRIS software is not required on the target host. However, the target host needs to have similar specifications to the source host, including operating system and processor.
That the following users and groups must be created on the target host: instance owner, effective user for InterSystems Database superserver and its jobs, effective group for InterSystems Database processes, and a group that has permissions to start and stop InterSystems Database instances. The user and group IDs need to match with the user and group IDs on the source host. The instance is brought up by using the same mount points as those mount points found on the source machine, so ensure these mounts are not in use on the target.

When you restore to a target with running InterSystems Database instances, the instances display as valid targets. That IBM Spectrum Copy Data Management not interacts with these instances, but instead start a new instance by using mapped mount points. When you restore to a target with no prior InterSystems Database instances, IBM Spectrum Copy Data Management creates a placeholder that acts as a restore target. For example, on InterSystems Caché the placeholder is named cache_general. That cache_general need to be used only as a restore target and not be selected for backup.

Single InterSystems Databases can be restored through an Instant Disk Restore job, which mounts physical volumes on the target machine. Granular recovery can then be run through InterSystems commands.


 

Instant Database restore for InterSystems Databases:

When you run an instant database restore to another compatible Linux system, you must first register that system in IBM Spectrum Copy Data Management as an InterSystems database to which the existing database can be restored. Ensure that no existing mounts exist on the new system that might conflict with mounts that are restored. For example, /cache/db and cache/log for InterSystems Caché and /IRISHealth/db and /IRISHealth/log/ for InterSystems IRIS. The database is started automatically. If it is not, start the database instance.

For InterSystems Caché:

$ cd /cache/db/bin
$ ccontrol start <name_of_instance>

For InterSystems IRIS:

$ cd /IRISHealth/db/bin
$ iris start <name_of_instance>

When you run an instant database restore to the same InterSystems database system or another system running an InterSystems database, the source and destination mount points must be different for both /cache/db and /cache/log for InterSystems Caché and /IRISHealth/db and /IRISHealth/log/ for InterSystems IRIS. InterSystems Caché Databases can be restored only to another InterSystems Caché system and InterSystems IRIS Databases can be only restored to another InterSystems IRIS system. Additionally, the destination database must be stopped because the port used to run the database can be used only by one database at a time per server. To stop the database from running, issue the following command:

For InterSystems Caché:

$ ccontrol stop <name_of_instance>

For InterSystems IRIS:

$ iris stop <name_of_instance>



 

Sample Configuration of an IBM Spectrum Copy Data Management Agent User

The following commands are examples for creating and configuring an operating system user that IBM Spectrum Copy Data Management use to log in to the application server. The command syntax might vary depending on your operating system type and version.

  • Create the user that is designated as the IBM Spectrum Copy Data Management agent user: 
    useradd -m cdmagent
  • If you use password-based authentication, set a password: 
    passwd cdmagent
  • If you use key-based authentication, place the public key in /home/cdmagent/.ssh/authorized_keys, or the appropriate file depending on your sshd configuration, and ensure the correct ownership and permissions are set, such as: 
    chown -R cdmagent:cdmagent /home/cdmagent/.ssh
chmod 700 /home/cdmagent/.ssh
chmod 600 /home/cdmagent/.ssh/authorized_keys
  • Place the following lines at the end of your sudoers configuration file, typically /etc/sudoers. If the existing sudoers file is configured to import configuration from another directory (for example, /etc/sudoers.d), you can also place the lines in a new file in that directory: 
    Defaults:cdmagent !requiretty
cdmagent ALL=(ALL) NOPASSWD:ALL



 

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Document Information

Modified date:
16 March 2023

UID

ibm16957432

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